With advances in semiconductor technology, there has been increasing demand for higher storage capacity, faster processing systems, higher performance, and lower costs. To meet these demands, the semiconductor industry continues to scale down the dimensions of semiconductor devices, such as metal oxide semiconductor field effect transistors (MOSFETs), including planar MOSFETs and fin field effect transistors (finFETs). Such scaling down has increased the complexity of semiconductor manufacturing processes.
Illustrative embodiments will now be described with reference to the accompanying drawings. In the drawings, like reference numerals generally indicate identical, functionally similar, and/or structurally similar elements.